whistleblowers: wikileaks, snowden i...

[malkin]

http://obamaischeckingyouremail.tumblr.com/ :D

[Lord Protector]

Edward Snowden: the whistleblower behind revelations of NSA surveillanceobjavljen identitet momka koji je odao tajne podatke iz nsa.sakriio se u hong kong, zanimljiv izbor.

U Hong Kongu ne mogu da ga uhapse...Kinezi ga sigurno prate i obezbeđuju (čak i bez njegovog znanja) i neće dozvoliti da ga bilo koja druga služba uhapsi, kidnapuje ili nešto slično. Pametan izbor lokacije. Faktički je prebegao, jedino što sada Amerikanci mogu je da ga namame da se vrati u USA nekim ucenama vezanim za porodicu.Da mu je život ugrožen, jeste, ovakve stvari se u obaveštajnom svetu ne praštaju, omerta je gora od sicilijanske verzije. Posebno je sada frka šta je sve od dokumenata uzeo i šta sve može da isporuči medijima. Edited June 10, 2013 by slow

[Indy]

Ne daju mu da prica, a sve je u pravu. :( http://youtu.be/YB7ZaK7Oa88

[Prospero]

Leaker’s Employer Became Wealthy by Maintaining Government Secrets By BINYAMIN APPELBAUM and ERIC LIPTON Published: June 9, 2013WASHINGTON — Edward J. Snowden’s employer, Booz Allen Hamilton, has become one of the largest and most profitable corporations in the United States almost exclusively by serving a single client: the government of the United States. Mary F. Calvert for The New York Times John M. McConnell, a former director of national intelligence, is now an executive at Booz Allen.Over the last decade, much of the company’s growth has come from selling expertise, technology and manpower to the National Security Agency and other federal intelligence agencies. Booz Allen earned $1.3 billion, 23 percent of the company’s total revenue, from intelligence work during its most recent fiscal year.The government has sharply increased spending on high-tech intelligence gathering since 2001, and both the Bush and Obama administrations have chosen to rely on private contractors like Booz Allen for much of the resulting work.Thousands of people formerly employed by the government, and still approved to deal with classified information, now do essentially the same work for private companies. Mr. Snowden, who revealed on Sunday that he provided the recent leak of national security documents, is among them.As evidence of the company’s close relationship with government, the Obama administration’s chief intelligence official, James R. Clapper Jr., is a former Booz Allen executive. The official who held that post in the Bush administration, John M. McConnell, now works for Booz Allen.“The national security apparatus has been more and more privatized and turned over to contractors,” said Danielle Brian, the executive director of the Project on Government Oversight, a nonprofit group that studies federal government contracting. “This is something the public is largely unaware of, how more than a million private contractors are cleared to handle highly sensitive matters.”It has gone so far, Ms. Brian said, that even the process of granting security clearances is often handled by contractors, allowing companies to grant government security clearances to private sector employees.Companies like Booz Allen, Lockheed Martin and the Computer Sciences Corporation also engage directly in gathering information and providing analysis and advice to government officials. Booz Allen employees work inside the facilities at the N.S.A., among the most secretive of the intelligence agencies. The company also has several office buildings near the agency’s headquarters in Fort Meade, Md.The company employs about 25,000 people, almost half of whom hold top secret security clearances, providing “access to information that would cause ‘exceptionally grave damage’ to national security if disclosed to the public,” according to a company securities filing.In January, Booz Allen announced that it was starting work on a new contract worth perhaps as much as $5.6 billion over five years to provide intelligence analysis services to the Defense Department. Under the deal, Booz Allen employees are being assigned to help military and national security policy makers, the company said.Representative Peter T. King, a New York Republican and former chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, said he had no reason to believe that a private contractor was more likely to become a source to reporters than a government official, because both need a security clearance before they can handle top secret information.“Security is so tight and procedures so strictly enforced, this is really a surprise,” he said of the leaks by Mr. Snowden. “This will have to be fully investigated, inside and out, to find out what happened here. Were there warning signs? Were there issues in his background?”Stewart A. Baker, who served as general counsel at the N.S.A. in the 1990s and more recently as a top official at the Department of Homeland Security, said he worried that the reliance on outside contractors might, in some ways at least, make the government more vulnerable to leaks.“Inside the government, there are structures designed to make sure that people understand that they can raise concerns about the lawfulness of particular activities in a variety of established channels,” Mr. Baker said. “You can go to the inspector general or to the Intelligence Committees, and you don’t have to pierce the veil of secrecy to get high-level attention to your concerns without exposing national secrets. It is a little less obvious to employees at a contractor.”Booz Allen, which notes in securities filings that its business could be damaged by leaks, acknowledged in a statement that Mr. Snowden had been an employee.The company, based in Virginia, is primarily a technology contractor. It reported revenues of $5.76 billion for the fiscal year ended in March and was No. 436 on Fortune’s list of the 500 largest public companies. The government provided 98 percent of that revenue, the company said.Its rapid growth, fueled by government investment after the Sept. 11 attacks, led to a 2008 buyout by the Carlyle Group, a private equity firm, followed by a public offering in 2010.Booz Allen has formed a particularly close relationship with the intelligence agencies, and others besides Mr. Clapper and Mr. McConnell have spent time in the company’s executive offices.Mr. McConnell has been an advocate for increased federal spending on cybersecurity. He told the CBS News program “60 Minutes” in 2010 that foreign governments had the capacity to bring down the country’s power grid and financial system.“The United States is not prepared for such an attack,” he said.The company has also had at least one previous highly publicized problem maintaining data security. In 2011, files maintained by Booz Allen were acquired by the online activist group Anonymous, which claimed to have stolen tens of thousands of encrypted military passwords.Christopher Drew contributed reporting from New York.

[Indy]

Assange, veceras za ozi TVhttp://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-06-10/assanges-political-ambition/4744972

[Indy]

Izgleda da Hong Kong (oficijelno) ne zeli Edwarda Snowdena, a on se pak interesuje za Island...

[Anduril]

Leaker’s Employer Became Wealthy by Maintaining Government Secrets....

Klasicna odlika svih fasistickih rezima - delimicna privatizacija drzavnih institucija.

[DarkAttraktor]

vec su se oglasili Jonsdotirova (poslanica Pirate Party-ja, eks Vikiliks) i smarac Smari Mekarti iz Instituta za Moderne Medije Islanda:

Statement regarding involvement of IMMI in Edward Snowden asylum requestReykjavík, Iceland and San Francisco, California9. June 2013 // For immediate releaseOver the last few days we at the International Modern Media Institute have watched alongside the rest of the world as the US government’s enormous encroachments on privacy and information security have been exposed in the media. These exposures have verified our greatest fears about the state of global intelligence gathering, and yet again highlighted the need for strong privacy protections and government transparency.Tonight the identity of Edward Snowden, the brave whistleblower who exposed these clandestine projects for monitoring the world’s population, was revealed in an interview, where it was implied that he has an interest in seeking asylum in Iceland. Whereas IMMI is based in Iceland, and has worked on protections of privacy, furtherance of government transparency, and the protection of whistleblowers, we feel it is our duty to offer to assist and advise Mr. Snowden to the greatest of our ability.We are currently attempting to get in touch with Mr. Snowden to confirm that this is his will and discuss the details of his asylum request. Our next step will be to assess the security implications of asylum, as it is possible that Iceland may not be the best location, depending on various questions regarding the legal framework - all of these issues will be taken into account. We are already working on detailing the legal protocols required to apply for asylum, and will over the course of the week be seeking a meeting with the newly appointed interior minister of Iceland, Mrs. Hanna Birna Kristjánsdóttir, to discuss whether an asylum request can be processed in a swift manner, should such an application be made.In due course we will release further statements as useful and necessary.Contact:Birgitta JónsdóttirChairman of the Boardbirgitta@immi.is+354 692 8884(PST / UTC-7)Smári McCarthyExecutive Directorsmari@immi.is+354 662 2701(UTC)

[dragance]

Ne daju mu da prica, a sve je u pravu. :(http://youtu.be/YB7ZaK7Oa88

Kakav dileja. Ne znam samo da li zaista veruje u ove ludosti ili GlenBekuje u istom trzistu.

[Indy]

Dangers of blowing the whistle in the digital ageWhistleblower Edward Snowden's stunning story provides an insight into government power at almost the exact moment the future echo of his story is playing out in a military courtroom in the US.Snowden has identified himself as the source of revelations about the mass spying operations undertaken by America's National Security Agency as part of its Prism program. The motivation for his revelation, that the NSA has vacuumed up internet and phone data of millions of everyday people, was solely ''to inform the public as to what is done in their name and that which is done against them''. Almost certainly forfeiting his family relationships, his home and possibly his liberty, Snowden's courage is of the finest variety. This massive operation by the NSA destroys the concept of privacy as we know it, but paradoxically few knew about it until Snowden blew the whistle. Who knows whether something similar to Prism is already happening in Australia?Snowden's calm acceptance of his fate is impressive. His story is remarkably similar to that of Bradley Manning and there is a good chance it will have a similar outcome personally. Coincidentally, Snowden's leak came in the week Manning's trial finally began. His treatment alone, as a prisoner of conscience, should be cause for alarm. He has waited for more than three years for this day, in breach of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, which requires a speedy trial. He has suffered in conditions that are cruel, inhuman and degrading. That is not hyperbole: it is the view of the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture.Mainstream reporting has described Manning as a funny little character or weirdo. This not only lacks compassion, but is wilfully blind. Manning is a humanist: indeed, the back of his dog tag was stamped with that exact word. Like so many whistleblowers, including Snowden, he saw injustice and tried to expose it. He explicitly wanted to ''spark a domestic debate on the role of the military and our foreign policy''. He rightly asked: ''[if] you saw incredible things, awful things … things that belonged in the public domain, and not on some server stored in a dark room in Washington DC … what would you do?'' He had tried to raise concerns up the chain of command and was told to ''shut up''. To expose wrongdoing in this context is admirable; to continue to collaborate in its concealment is the opposite.Both Manning and Snowden have been very deliberate in their actions. Neither sought to sell the information, though this would have undoubtedly been profitable, because of a belief that it belonged in the public sphere. Neither sought to engage in an indiscriminate dump of documents. Snowden says he reviewed every document he leaked. Manning carefully collected material he thought both evidenced injustice and was also unlikely to harm US troops. In this, he has so far been proven correct.For Snowden, he must wait to see what happens next. Hopefully his fate and the outcomes of his actions will diverge from that of Manning's.As far as we know, no one has faced trial for the crimes exposed by Manning's leaks. Most notably this included a video showing the killing of 12 people, including two Reuters journalists. In fact, despite Manning having already pleaded guilty to crimes with a potential 20-year sentence, the prosecution have put him on trial seeking to have him imprisoned for life. To do so, it has adopted the widest possible interpretation of the term ''aiding the enemy'' to cover any communication from military personnel that exposes weakness. The idea is that this communication, once published, could be read by the enemy, whoever that is, regardless of the intention of the communicator. This has a very serious chilling effect. It potentially covers the photos from Abu Ghraib showing prisoner mistreatment, comments by military personnel about deficient body armour, or even criticism about the military's handling of sexual assault allegations. It effectively precludes critical speech from a notoriously secret world.The US government sees the forest, not just the trees. This is an active attempt to destroy the spirit of anyone within the US military with sympathies towards exposing wrongdoing. This is not just about Manning; it's an attempt to crush all potential whistleblowers.To that end, there is a whole further set of people who are affected by this trial, whether they like it or not: journalists. Manning exposed war crimes by giving documents to a publisher. As expected, the prosecutors are seeking to link Manning to Julian Assange and the publishing site, WikiLeaks. But it could just as well be the New York Times, Fairfax or the Guardian. As Michael Ratner from the Centre for Constitutional Rights has stated: this trial is both a major attack on truth tellers and on journalists. It behoves us to defend them both if we wish to see more of either in the future.Whistleblowers are vital to our press and our democracy. They provide some of the best information about the workings of closed environments such as corporations and government. Interestingly, what is demonstrated by Snowden's story, and Glenn Greenwald's fearless journalism, is that intimidation is a weak defence against the human instinct to expose injustice. While governments continue to misuse power under the cover of darkness, good people will invariably let the sunshine in. We must protect them. As Matt Taibbi wrote: ''If you can be punished for making public a crime, then the government doing the punishing is itself criminal.''Both Manning and Snowden, like all whistleblowers, have a defence: the public interest. That is currently not available to Manning because of a ruling that sees his motivations as only relevant for sentencing purposes. It must be reversed and be taken into account in all such similar legal contexts. Without this, Manning's actions make no sense and his treatment looks like a show trial. When we start to criminalise dissent and the exposure of injustice in this way, it has very serious consequences for our society. As Ben Wizner from the American Civil Liberties Union noted: ''Sometimes what may be helpful to the enemy is also indispensable to the public in a functioning democracy''. If you think Manning's trial has nothing to do with your privacy or democratic rights, think again.Elizabeth O'Shea is a human rights lawyer in Melbourne

[aram]

nobel za manninga

[Indy]

Potpisao^http://youtu.be/GI_HsQTCieg

[Bakemono]

Potpisao. Junak našeg doba.

[Prospero]

evo sa indyjevog omiljenog sajta :)http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUYpBqLVe7Uiz propratnog teksta:

That was in place for about 40 years, and finally in 1967 the Supreme Court in a case by the name of Katz came up with the idea that they'd finally had enough. And what happened in Katz was: Katz was making a bet or having some sort of an illegal conversation involving gambling in a phone booth and the police knew he was going to be there because he did this every day, so they had a microphone on the top of the phone booth and they managed to hear his half of the conversation. Based on that, they convicted him of crime. He said: "Violation of the Fourth Amendment. They didn't have a warrant; they didn't have probable cause. "The government answered, "But we didn't invade the space. He was in a phone booth and outside." The Supreme Court said, "We're going to jettison the idea of trespass and what we're going to have is a doctrine based on a 'reasonable expectation of privacy.'"So, what the Fourth Amendment now protects, in addition to places, it protects people's reasonable expectation of privacy. Which is good—if you have a reasonable expectation of privacy....And under another line of cases, the government can obtain any information that you freely disclose to third parties. I'll give you an example. If you keep your money in your mattress at home, they can't touch it. They can't look at it without getting a warrant. But if you give it to a bank then you've disclosed it to a third party; it's no longer private and the government can obtain it without complying with the Fourth Amendment. It's a doctrine that has huge implications in the era of electronic communications, because basically we don't ever communicate with each other anymore, except maybe in the bedroom, that doesn't go through some sort of an electronic means. And this is a huge problem....But, you know, every one of you can contribute to the answer to that question. Because the idea of a "reasonable expectation of privacy" is not so much what you expect but how we act as a society. If you post things on Facebook; if you put private photos on Facebook and other such social media sites, if you contribute to an environment where, as a society, we don't view the privacy of certain communications and certain activities as being sacrosanct, as being something that we should not disclose to the public, then you contribute to an environment where, when the Court does look at it, it views it realistically in the world, and they'll say, "Well, people must not care very much about the privacy of their private photos because look, they post all these on Facebook where the world can see them. They must not care so much about communications because they shout them out where everybody can hear them."So what I do is, if I'm in an airport and I hear someone loudly talking on a telephone, I make myself part of the conversation. I nod. If they say something sad I look glum. If they say a joke, I laugh. I genuinely want to make them know that I'm a part of their conversation. And I think it's important for all of us to be aware of this and all of us to be aware that when you give up your own privacy, you're not just giving up your own privacy, but you're contributing to society where the idea of privacy is undervalued.And who is going to be the beneficiary of that? It's going to be the government. Because you cannot deny the government anything that is open to any other party. That's the rule, and it's a fair one. If people treat things as not private; if people disclose them to everybody in the world, well certainly law enforcement is entitled to that as well....Until further notice, I would not consider anything you put on the cloud private. Is that clear? I'm not saying it's not going to be, but it's a highly undecided question. Essentially, if it's a new computer on your desk where the police actually have to go in and get the physical thing, it's protected. It's not protected from everything—obviously there's probable cause, a warrant; they can get it. But it's protected from unauthorized intrusion.If it's some place in the hands of third parties, it's like your bank information. You think your bank information is private, but no, it's not. You've disclosed your information to the bank, the government can get it. You disclose it to a third party in the cloud, the chances are very good that if the government wants it, it can take it.Some of it depends on the people who run the Internet service providers, the people who handle the cloud storage. Some fight back. Google fought back when the Justice Department asked for certain queries by their users. Some other search engines I will not mention did not fight back. Some phone companies are cheery about giving out your location information, other phone companies will, for a fee, let law enforcement ping your phone. And they can ping it as often as they want and know exactly where you are by pinging your phone. Is there anybody here that doesn't have at least one cell device on them right this minute? I didn't think so. So when they ping all our phones they will find where the great libertarian conspiracy is located. Right here.But they can do it. Some phone companies, for a fee, actually have a self-serve website where law enforcement can go in, ping your phone, and know exactly where you are. Pretty neat, huh? So anyway, the answer is, kiss it goodbye.

[Indy]

Bravo, uvek nadjes nesto od cega mi pripadne mukica. EDIT. Ako kapiram citajuci dijagonalno, tekst je jos jedna normalizacija postojeceg stanja. Kao, pa normalno da prisluskuju, a sta bi drugo trebalo... Da, tacno, mukica.

Edited June 11, 2013 by Indy